Once all three projects are completed, I’ll move on to BreyerFest stuff.
I made good progress on all three because I’ve been trying to limit the computer time. Just too many aggravating hobby personalities and situations I don’t want to deal with, even in the most passive ways.
Except for one. While I don’t have a vested interest in any of the locations for next year’s NAN, as it is unlikely that I’d be able to attend regardless, I am extremely curious to see how the current NAMHSA crisis du jour turns out.
I have had my issues with NAMHSA - I think they spend too much time focusing on an end result (the "Big Show") and not enough time focusing on foundational issues (like the reason and purpose of The Show in the first place). Some of the individuals in charge have occasionally fallen into my personal "don’t want to deal with" group.
Yet curiously, and unlike a lot of hobbyists, I think everything will be fine in the end. The existence of dysfunction is not the problem: stuff happens, no matter how much or how well you plan. How the dysfunction is dealt with is the truer measure of judging an organization's viability.
Maybe I’m a little inured to some of the drama because I’ve been in the hobby long enough to have seen most of it before. I’ve also dealt with similar issues in other interests of mine and know it is not unique to us. (Google "SFWA Controversies" if you want to see some real hair-raising stuff. And today, apparently, the 2014 Hugo nominations. Yikes!)
You made it this far with my pontificating, so here are a couple of pictures from Marney’s Album, as conciliatory Easter Eggs. Notice anything odd about them?
Woodgrains had been largely discontinued at that point - only the Fighter remained in production by 1970 - but we know that Special Run Woodgrains were being made in the late 1960s and into the early 1970s for the Dunning Industries Ranchcraft line.
It’s hard to identify those later Special Run Woodgrains, absent their presence on lamps, because there’s no way of distinguishing them from earlier releases. We only know that Non-Fighting Stallion Woodgrains were manufactured (and not simply pulled from warehouse backstock) after 1966/7 because Running Mare and Foal lamps can be found with USA marks, as well as Woodgrains of molds that simply didn’t exist prior, such as the Polled Hereford Bull.
All of the other Woodgrains in the album are on molds that had been released as Woodgrains before, so they could all be items from her collection that she had picked up elsewhere.
Yet there are other photos in the album of pieces that are clearly attempts at reproducing vintage molds in vintage colors, like the Old Mold Mares I’ve mentioned here before.
There will never be any definitive proof unless one of those album pieces does show up - and only if it has a USA mark. I haven't seen or heard of any so far, but I’ve seen a lot of unlikely things, especially lately.
3 comments:
I have seen a woodgrain fighting stallion without socks and blaze.
I didn't inspect him though to see if he had a USA stamp or not.
I've seen a couple on eBay and elsewhere. The sockless Fighters seem to be a rare-but-not-insanely-so variation.
The sockless fighters then must be more common (if there is such a thing!) than the mustang and five-gaiter-never have seen or heard of such a variation as that on those two models. Just love learning new things like this!
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